nmanc33

On 2/29/2024 at 11:17 AM, hardship_wavier21 said:

Congratulations! Who was your sponsor?

5 hours ago, PJAW said:

My statement of reason for DOS form DS3035 was four sentences or so.  Just a brief summary of why I was legally entitled to relief.  Short, but accurate summary one paragraph long.   DOS receives a copy of your form 612 and accompanying documents form USCIS when the Form 613 is issued upon USCIS finding of hardship.

Have you received your recommendation yet?

18 hours ago, Hardship2022 said:

Yes. 

Thank you! I honestly had no idea you send the same exact things to both departments.

On 2/24/2024 at 4:24 PM, Hardship2022 said:

my statement of reason along with supporting documents and evidence was around 100 pages. I have submitted All the supporting documents to DOS and USCIS

So you sent the same for both?

On 2/20/2024 at 4:31 PM, Hardship2022 said:

It is the final stage and you will hear from them very soon. I was going insane after the sponsor view request, checking my DOS page multiple times a day, including in the middle of the night.

BTW, I am a self filer and you can see. I would never ever pay a lawyer for something I could do myself. I adjusted my status myself too. Zero lawyers involved.

Good luck and keeps us all posted. 

If you don't mind me asking, how long was your statement of reason on the DS-3035 and how long was your statement for USCIS? Correct me if I'm wrong, but you don't send all the evidence to DOS, instead to USCIS then they will send their I-613 to DOS if they find hardship right?

Thanks!

22 hours ago, lennikov said:

The DOS does not request sponsor views if the case involves the health of the US citizen (i.e., US citizen receiving some life-saving therapy that can only be provided in the US and reasonably expected to not be available outside of the US), as even with the negative opinion of the sponsor, the case would still get a favorable recommendation based on humanitarian and compassionate grounds. 

Very curious where you've read this... 

Processing time update.

7 hours ago, corgidance said:

I think so. The program website just says sponsored by DOS. It's not Fulbright. But it's a high school exchange program, so likely that the sponsor is ECA, but I'm not 100% sure.

Got it! That's great that it made it to DOS!

What was the funding amount they put on the DS-2019?

20 hours ago, corgidance said:

Can't figure out how to reply to comments here. But no, I didn't contact a representative or do anything but sit and wait. I highly doubt that contacting my congressperson from Texas would have helped things. I really hope that DOS is speeding up their processes now and all still waiting will get answers soon.

was your sponsor ECA?

1 hour ago, Sabina Bart said:

US Gov I believe, but it was not even a four-year college so it's not a lot. I don't even know whom to reach like I said my program was suspended for a while and then it changed couple of times it's co sponsors… so I am not sure. 

When did DOS receive your case? 

Who was the original sponsor on DS-2019 (ECA/x/x for example) or something else and did your program number have a G-1, G-2, etc?

1 hour ago, Sabina Bart said:

Also a question, do you know a person there you can reach out to? I honestly don't even know anyone like I said my program (I was eleven years ago on this program!) it was under a different agency, then another agency took over and now another one… I found their email but I have no idea who the people there are. 

Congressman/Congresswoman would be your best bet.

13 hours ago, Sabina Bart said:

Mine was Ugrad 

Was the funding from US government or university?

6 hours ago, Wyboxcx said:

Has anyone with gov funding tried to reach out to the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs to ask for a favorable recommendation? 

I will likely reach out when the time is right, so they can at-least keep an eye out for sponsor views when it's requested. Was your sponsor ECA?

1 hour ago, Sabina Bart said:

Nope different and it was suspended for a while in my country, what's ECA? 

What was suspended?

Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.

2 hours ago, Sabina Bart said:

Dept of state, yours? I am sorry they denied your Non objection and also they shouldn’t request another sponsor views for your case fyi since they already did for that other waiver. Don’t worry! 

State department as well. ECA?

1 hour ago, Sabina Bart said:

Mine does unfortunately  But I am not Fulbright, I know Fulbright scholarships are a way higher… since it’s on higher level education. 
Yes I will talk to my Senator today, I tried it once but they told me it’s early and yes first come and first serve etc, they wrote that too, but now it’s 12 months for me even more a bit than 12 months. 

Hi Sabina, who was your sponsor?

We were denied no objection and hoping we don't have to go through sponsor views request again for hardship.

48 minutes ago, blooper1899 said:

 

I think they skip the ones with government funding and wait to accumulate cases with the same sponsor. Then they do a batch of sponsor view requests. That's my hypothesis. My case is from June 2022 with funding, and they skipped them initially. Then for three cases that I know of they sent SV requests on Jan 25-26. 

Who was your sponsor?

16 hours ago, worrieduser said:

So a request for expedite=denial, wow ! 

I doubt this is true. 

12 hours ago, Used to be broken said:

Very different process for this than the I-601 and a different standard for hardship

I-601/601A being of higher standard and harder, right?

6 minutes ago, hideaki said:

@nmanc33 I guess we all do that. How long is yours? Mine and other people I know range from 5-20 pages.

My USCIS statement is 18 pages - with 50+ pages of supporting documents

6 minutes ago, hideaki said:

@nmanc33 You can print your Statement of Reason on a separate document to attach with your DS-3035, and leave a note on the SOR in the DS-3035 form with something like "find the SOR in the supporting document". 

So it is ok to use the same statement that I send to USCIS? It's fairly long.

20 minutes ago, Boiler said:

Just to be sure this is a J1 HRR waiver?

Yes

Hi Everyone,

For those of you that went through the exceptional hardship waiver (I-612), did you use the same statement on DOS's DS-3035 as you did on your USCIS statement?

Our USCIS statement is long and we're not sure if we should copy/paste it into the DS-3035, or if we should summarize it for DOS?

Thanks!

Need assistance/guidance regarding hardship waiver please.

Our statement for USCIS is quite long, but confused about the statement of reason for DOS DS-3035 form - do I copy/paste the same statement from USCIS or do I write a summary?

Thanks!

12 hours ago, lennikov said:

I honestly doubt it, there is no indication that waiver involving less money invested into scholar are handled differently. It’s not really about money even few hundred thousands spend on 5 years J-1 scholar is nothing in the grandiose of US gov economy. It’s more about the promise you made (even if you did not fully understand this promise at the time) and now trying to break. 

This is where the whole thing becomes subjective in my eyes. The promise that was made may be broken, but based off of changes in life that were unforeseen - just like they offer the waiver in the first place, it's from their understanding that things do change in life. Particularly in hardship cases, my personal opinion is that it is about protecting their citizens from going through a legitimate, documented hardship. Whether it's been on-going or caused by the program home residency rule itself (the US citizen never signed up for it, very important to keep this in mind).

The most confusing part to me is when a program no longer exists or doesn't operate yearly because there aren't enough participants - not sure if they treat that more lightly or not.

Do you believe that they weigh the short term programs (few weeks) - in which the participant didn't get paid more lightly than Fulbright?

1 hour ago, Kalaz said:

what type of funding is considered government funding?

There are many, but examples could be the various bureau's of the government. Not sure what category Fulbright falls under.

2 hours ago, lennikov said:

There is no way to prove it. They would always say something “Careful consideration is given for each individual case”. But if you see how negligent are bureaucrats are across the country institutions I would not be surprised at all. You can’t even tell if you have government funding until you see request for sponsor views is send by DOS. You might think you have it and it’s never send and decided without sponsor views or you may think you don’t have it and then see the sponsor views are send. 

I absolutely see your point. At the end, we're all people and we realize what is hardship and what is not. I just believe there is a lot of "scare" in hardship cases, especially when it comes to government funding, but overall, there overall denial rate for exceptional hardship cases are not high (I think less than 5% per year the last few years). Likely, and this is just a guess, the denials come from lack of documentation and proof.

Even though I have spoken to an attorney that has said it doesn't matter if it was $1 or $1,000,000, they look at the case as government funding only - which I still have a hard time believing this is such a thing, other than to cause fear to get one's business. Maybe they tread more carefully if the funding is more than tens of thousands of dollars, but it wouldn't make any sense to harm their citizen over a few dollars or thousands of dollars (as long as their is legitimate exceptional hardship).

At the end of the day, the US government is here to protect its citizens and their well being - if all documentation is given for proof, there is no reason for a denial.